Fore! Competitive balance vote gets another swing

Apr. 27, 2014

Licking Valley's Cassidy Green tries to spike a ball over two Newark Catholic blockers during a Licking County League match this past fall. The OHSAA competitive balance proposal, slated to start Thursday and go through May 15, could alter the postseason landscape for Ohio's public and private schools. / Jessica Phelps/The Advocate

Written by

Larry Phillips

CentralOhio.com

COLUMBUS — Four votes in four years. No one can say the Ohio High School Athletic Association is ignoring the issue of competitive balance.

The latest plan, recommended from the 27-member OHSAA Competitive Balance Committee, is similar to the proposal member schools rejected 327-308 in spring 2013. A simple majority vote among the 825 Ohio high school principals is needed for passage.

The next vote is slated to start Thursday and go through May 15. According to OHSAA commissioner Dan Ross, this one offers the best chance to fundamentally balance the state team tournaments in football, boys and girls basketball, baseball, softball, boys and girls soccer and volleyball.

“I honestly believe that this is the best proposal that we’ve had so far,” Ross said. “The modified version is the result of a compilation of input from our superintendents, principals, athletic administrators and coaches. I’m most proud that we were able to work together and come up with a solution that will create a better system than we currently have because it looks at how schools secure the enrollment of their students participating in interscholastic athletics.”

Fairness is the crux of the issue, and it found a voice in March from the explosive comments of Poland Seminary boys basketball coach Ken Grisdale. After his team absorbed a 54-42 season-ending loss to Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary in a Division II regional, the veteran coach vented his frustration in the Youngstown Vindicator.

“It isn’t the way it’s supposed to be,” Grisdale said of the Irish roster. “Four out of (their) five starters aren’t even Ohio kids.”

Grisdale was referring to sophomore V.J. King’s family moving in from Charlotte, N.C. Jalen Hudson arrived from Richmond, Va. Jibril Blount, son of former Pittsburgh Steelers’ cornerback Mel Blount, is a transplant from Wheeling (Linsly), W.Va. and Josh Williams transferred in from Barberton. King and Hudson have northeast Ohio roots, but that didn’t lessen Grisdale’s bitterness.

“We have the best Division II public school team in Ohio,” Grisdale complained, inaccurately considering public school Norwalk won the state championship. “I don’t know how taxpayers in the state of Ohio or (a) public school system, how they deal with this.”

“I’ve taken it for 21 years.”

In St. Vincent-St. Mary’s defense, the school is following the rules in place. Yet the balance of power has long tipped away from public schools.

The OHSAA noted since the turn of the century public schools have won 56.7 percent of the state championships across all sports. Private schools, which make up fewer than 20 percent of the Ohio pool, have won 43.3 percent.

Of the 715 schools that play football, only 80 are private institutions, about 11 percent. Yet private schools have won 99 of 215 state football championships (46.1 percent) since the tournament began in 1972.

In boys basketball, there is a similar imbalance of power. Of the 798 schools that played boys basketball this year, 130 are not public entities, 16.2 percent. But private schools have won 53 of 159 state basketball titles (33.3 percent) since the tournament branched into three classifications in 1971. A fourth division was added in 1988.

This proposal also addresses public schools that benefit by athletes transferring in from beyond their district. A three-tiered points system would assign a factor to all student-athletes who play that specific sport in the high school (freshmen through seniors). The factors would be used within a math formula that would determine the athletic count for divisional alignment — instead of the raw enrollment data by itself.

The aim is to level the playing field or court for everyone.

“This is an issue that a majority of other states wrestle with,” said Bob Goldring, Associate Commissioner for Operations at the OHSAA. “There are a variety of solutions out there but no one seems to have a solution upon which everyone can agree.”

Ross said approximately 75 to 80 percent of member institutions generally participate in the vote.

Locally, according to the OHSAA, 11 of 12 schools in the Newark area cast eligible ballots in the 2012 vote, and 9 of 12 in 2013.

“That’s far better than a general election, but we would like as much representation as possible,” Ross said.